An Outdoor Banner Series
out there is a series of banners on the exterior of the Thunder Bay Art Gallery.
This project is a platform for new images, stories, and moments by new creative voices. Each banner is a bold canvas for artists, designers, and makers who experiment with new media, take new paths in artistic careers and claim space beyond traditional art gallery walls.
Be out there.
Nyle Johnston and Joel Richardson
Gaganoonidiwag: They Talk To Each Other
digital work, 2025
About the work
This banner is an extension of the collaborative exhibition Gaganoonidiwag / They Talk to Each Other by artists Nyle “Miigizi” Johnston and Joel Richard that was on view from January 11 to April 13, 2025, at the Thunder Bay Art Gallery. Riffing on digital media, collage, and street art, this Y2K-aesthetic banner layers digital portraits of the two artists with imagery based in Anishinaabe cosmologies and settler understandings of Canadian history. Colorful and chaotic, the banner creates space for new understandings – including optimism — based in friendship, open communication, and lived experience.
Artist BIO
Nyle “Miigizi” Johnston’s spirit name, Wiishkoonseh Miigizi’enh, means Whistling White Headed Eagle. He grew up in Chippewas of Nawash Unceded First Nation and apprenticed with Storytellers since his youth. A painter, mural artist, traditional storyteller, and traditional helper, Johnston uses his gift of storytelling to connect his peoples’ stories of love and healing with the broader world and offers support to a range of community organizations. His artistic practice is focused on illustrating stories of the Anishinaabe Nation in a variety of media to raise awareness of their histories as they in turn inform his process. He was born and raised on his beautiful reserve, Neyaashiinigmiing, on the Saugeen Peninsula (Bruce Peninsula) and took a keen interest in painting and art at a very young age. His work has been exhibited across major institutions, including the AGO, ROM, Evergreen Brickworks and the Chippewas of Nawash Cultural Centre. Johnston’s Diiyah Muh’gaanag (Our First Family) is an ongoing installation in the Jennings Youth gallery at the AGO. Drawn in a pictographic style, this installation tells stories of botany, astrology and the interconnectedness of all living things. Johnston currently lives in Toronto, Ontario, and is a contributing member to the Indigenous & Canadian collection at the AGO.
Joel Richardson is a multi-media artist whose work spans over twenty years. His extensive body of art includes large scale installation, performance, re-workings of digital technology, video, film, portrait and mural painting. He rose to national attention in 2011 when then Toronto mayor Rob Ford erased an original work commissioned by the City of Toronto, a 150-meter-long mural of a series of men and women in business attire interspersed with the extensive Black-Scholes equation. This piece translated into further shows in New York, Miami, Moscow and Toronto. His recent major projects include a large-scale multi-faceted historical exhibition in collaboration with the Tom Thomson Gallery. He is currently working with Olympic champion Matthew Birrir on the “Metipso Portal”, an international community interactive collaboration with many participants and moving parts based in Canada and Africa.